Jimmy Fallon to perform comedy show in Woolsey

Jimmy Fallon will perform at a comedy show Sept. 13 in Woolsey Hall, Yale College Council President Andrew Allison ’04 said Wednesday.

The YCC will sponsor the event, which will be held at 9 p.m. in the 2,700 seat auditorium. Allison said the council was considering charging about $15 for tickets to cover costs, but had not yet reached a decision. Tickets will go on sale Aug. 28.

Fallon is a regular on “Saturday Night Live,” hosted the 2001 MTV Movie Awards and was named one of People’s 50 Most Beautiful People in the World last spring. He appeared in the HBO mini-series “Band of Brothers” and has been cast in Woody Allen’s next movie, “Anything Else.”

YCC Vice-President Ryan Sheely ’04 said in an e-mail that the YCC chose Fallon because they thought he would be well suited for a college audience.

“We picked Jimmy Fallon because he is one of the best young comics around and is about to make it really big,” Sheely said. “When we were looking for comics, we felt that he really fit what we were looking for: a well-known act that was still affordable.”

Michael Mand of Creative Artists Agency, who represent Jimmy Fallon, said Fallon is releasing a new album entitled “In the Bathroom” on August 27, and hosting the MTV Video Music Awards two days later.

Fallon’s college shows differ from his regular performances in that he will be performing songs from the new album, Mand said.

The Woolsey show will take place at 9 pm on the last Friday of the fall shopping period. Allison estimated that the total cost of the contract, security and production would be around $40,000.

Undergraduate Organizations Funding Committee Chairman Elliott Mogul ’05 said he has been researching the cost of Fallon’s shows at other universities, and tickets have cost anywhere from $15 to $30, so at $15, Yale’s will be among the less expensive shows.

When the Roots performed at Yale in 1999, tickets were $15, and the show was widely successful, Allison said.

Last October, the Counting Crows performed on Old Campus as part of the final Tercentennial weekend. The event was paid for entirely by the university, but was planned in conjunction with the YCC.

Yale is not contributing any money to the event, but Allison said he has been talking with several administrators about the possibility of seeking corporate sponsorship.

“We’ve been talking to the administration about it and weighing different options so we haven’t done anything as of yet, but we’ve met,” Allison said. “It may just be local vendors, we may contact larger corporations or we may put all that off until Spring Fling.”

Mogul said he anticipated that they would seek more local sponsorship and sources of on-campus funding, such as from the UOFC.

Woolsey’s seating capacity is 2700, so if the YCC sells enough tickets, ticket sales alone could cover the cost of the show, Allison said.

Mogul said he did not think Woolsey would be too small for the event.

“I think it will be a really good venue,” Mogul said. “We don’t want to make it too big that you’re too far away, we want [students to be able] to see him up close. Kind of like how we had Guster last year, even though that wasn’t intentional.”

Allison said he anticipates there will be no opening act, but the YCC would like to collaborate with other organizations to plan activities for the rest of the night.

“We won’t schedule like a YCC event for after the concert, but we’re going to work with other groups to kind of make an evening out of it,” Allison said.